All the latest from the Propulsion Futures Beacon including news, scientific outputs, publications and events.
Propulsion Futures Beacon Newsletter
Welcome to our latest Propulsion Futures Beacon newsletter. We hope these quarterly newsletters give you a flavour of the many exciting activities going on within the Beacon.
One of the many exciting activities is the development of careers. Previously we have reported this for early career researchers but in this issue, I would like to say a big thank you to all the people past and present who have helped make the Beacon a success and congratulate them on their career progression which we have supported.
In the summer Romina Davoudi moved to a role as Strategic Portfolio Manager at the Aerospace Technology and Sarah Afriyie has just secured a Network Manager’s post for an EPSRC network grant here in Nottingham and will be leaving us in the new year. I am delighted to say Michele Pattison, who many of you will know from her work with the Energy Innovation and Collaboration team, is the new Propulsion Futures Beacon Head of Operations, ably assisted by Ella Crowther who has recently joined us.
The team have been busy with a Beacon call for innovative projects to support the University of Nottingham Zero Carbon Cluster and have received a fantastic response. We hope to take many of these projects forward into 2023.
I invite you to read about this and the latest developments below.
Nottingham installs a new facility, EPI2SEM, to support the development of two-dimensional semiconductors
Researchers in the Schools of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Nottingham have completed the installation of a new facility (EPI2SEM) for the EPItaxial growth and in-situ analysis of two-dimensional (2d) SEMiconductors. The EPI2SEM facility is supported by Nottingham and an EPSRC Strategic Equipment Award. It will provide the UK and international community with a unique capability for the transformative miniaturization and functionalization of semiconductors, supporting a wide-ranging programme of fundamental science and application-driven research.
EPI2SEM is a bespoke facility in Ultra-High Vacuum (UHV). It consists of a chamber for the synthesis of atomically thin 2d semiconductors by molecular beam epitaxy (MBE), a second chamber for band structure and chemical analysis by electron spectroscopy (nanoESCA), and a third chamber for morphological studies by scanning probe microscopy (SPM). All modules are interconnected in UHV by a linear transfer line (LTL), providing integrated sample transfer between growth and analysis chambers without contamination of the grown materials. 2d semiconductors with controlled layer thickness, composition and interfaces will provide a platform to reveal a rich variety of new quantum phenomena for science and technologies. These hold promise to revolutionize different sectors ranging from communication to computing and security towards a second quantum revolution.
As part of the Farnborough International Airshow held 18-22 July 2022 (FIA2022), a reduced scale demonstrator of the Clean Sky 2 WINGPULSE project was exhibited on the University of Nottingham Stand. Recent development of larger, more efficient Ultra High Bypass Ratio (UHBR) engines requires slat cutbacks at the juncture of the engine pylon, which significantly promotes drag and reduces lift in high angle of attack flight, such as take-off. The WINGPULSE project aims to mitigate the adverse effect of UHBR integration by incorporating novel active flow control (AFC) technology. AFC, in the form of pulsing air through a series of fine slots in the wing in the vicinity of the slat cutback, has the potential to reduce drag and recover maximum lift.
The model exhibited at FIA2022, a reduced scale demonstrator of the WINGPULSE model, was designed, built and successfully tested in a wind tunnel by a team of five undergraduate engineering students from M3 Department as part of a group design and make project, which ran October 2021 - June 2022. Find out more about the WINGPULSE project.
Held every two years, the Farnborough International Airshow is one of the world's biggest aerospace events and even more so for FIA2022, after a four-year absence. More information about FIA2022.
We would like to welcome Dr Martin Dornheim to the University of Nottingham, as he joins us to lead a team of experts who will enhance research strength in green hydrogen technologies as part of £4.7m Leverhulme International Professorship.
Dr Martin Dornheim is an internationally-recognised scientist in the field of hydrogen technology with a special focus on hydrogen storage and compression. He joins Nottingham from his current position as Head of the Department of Materials Design at the Institute of Hydrogen Technology at Helmholtz-Zentrum Hereon in Germany.
Net-zero video competition winners announced and showcased at COP27
As part of the UK-Egypt Higher Education Climate change partnership funded by the British Council, the Propulsion Futures Beacon and the University of Nottingham Energy Institute held a short video competition to find out how Early Career Researchers (ECR) and PhD Researchers are contributing to global net-zero targets. The competition was open to submissions from across the UK and Egypt and we were thrilled to have engaged with multiple universities. We received many high quality videos, and we are proud to announce our winners.
1st Place/£500 - Rahima Babayeva - Sheffield University
2nd Place/£300 - Disni Gamaralalage - University of Nottingham 3rd Place/£200 - Mentallah Soliman - Nile University Egypt
The winning videos were displayed at COP27 on Wednesday 16 November by Nile University Egypt.
Thank you to all our competition entrants for showcasing some of the wonderful net-zero research taking place across the UK and Egypt.
Our winning videos can be found here on mediaspace.
New facility to drive revolution in electric transport and power conversion
The Power Electronics and Machines Centre is a new £40M research facility that will drive forward advances in powerful, clean electrification technology.
Unveiled at the University of Nottingham's Jubilee Campus earlier in the year, the centre was supported by £4m of funding from the Propulsion Futures Beacon alongside additional investment.
The state-of-the-art facility will pave the way towards a new generation of low-carbon, sustainable electric vehicles, power and propulsion.
Recent work from the GSK Sustainability Labs has identified a new simple approach to making large ring-shaped molecules containing displaceable C-F bonds [DOI: 10.1039/d2sc05348a]. This work, published in the leading RSC journal Chemical Science required teamwork in synthetic, physical-organic and theoretical chemistry. The Woodward group plan to use these rings as precursors to a range of new light-weight organic (electronic) materials. The article will feature on one of the journal covers this month and the initial macrocycle is already commercially available.
The Nottingham Applied Materials and Interfaces (NAMI) group within the School of Chemistry has begun a new collaboration with OXLiD, a UK-based start-up company with links to the Faraday Institute which aims to develop commercially viable lithium-sulfur batteries. To strengthen the collaboration and accelerate the development of battery materials at Nottingham, several OXLiD researchers now occupy laboratory and office space within the Carbon Neutral Laboratories on Jubilee Campus.
For further information on these initiatives, or to find out more about work within the NAMI group, contact Darren Walsh, Graham Newton, or Lee Johnson.
New Beacon Members
Michele Pattison, Head of Operations
Michele has worked for several years in environmental and energy related roles at the University of Nottingham. She now joins us as the Head of Operations for the University of Nottingham Energy Institute and Propulsion Futures Beacon
Ella has been working at the University since October 2020. Ella started out as a history student, graduated in 2019 and joined the Admissions team a year later. She spent some time earlier this year in the Business and Chemistry Schools working in the Education and Student Experience Teams, and is now an Administrative Officer in the Beacon for Propulsion Futures. Ella also runs her own business making jewellery and is keen to raise the Beacon's profile via social media.
A series of webinars from external speakers has begun, with talks from Dr Agustin Valera-Medina of the University of Cardiff, Simon Webb, Chief Engineer of the FlyZero project, and Keith Budden, the Head of Business Development for Cenex. You can watch previous webinars from this year here and can watch last year's webinars here.
We welcome suggestions of future speakers - let us know who you would like to hear from! Please send any suggestions to the Propulsion Futures Beacon team.
Webinar series
Our webinar series runs throughout the year and continues on Wednesdays at 12.30pm via Microsoft Teams. Upcoming talks are:
18th January
Dr David Large - Professor of Geoscience, School of Engineering
The Beacon has invested a significant amount in world class facilities and equipment in labs across the Faculty of Science and Engineering in our aim to develop sustainable materials and technologies for greener, more electric transport systems.
Our laboratories and equipment continue to be open to University researchers and we encourage our academic and researcher community to use these in the development of collaborative grants and publications. For further information on how to access the equipment, please contact Karl Booker.
Research Collaboration
The Propulsion Futures Beacon is constantly looking to support new ideas and innovation in science and engineering to drive the discovery and translation of new materials, new components and new technologies for future, greener, propulsion systems in mobile applications. We continue to provide ongoing support and advice to our academics and researchers, develop and deliver events aimed at identifying new initiatives and provide access to unique equipment.
The Beacon Executive Boardis made up of members from the faculties of Engineering and Science. The board members are David Grant, Lee Johnson, Amalia Patanè, Chris Gerada, Richard Wheatley and Seamus Garvey. You can contact our Head of Operations, Michele Pattison, or any of the Board members to discuss ideas. The Board meets every three weeks and works hard to turn around ideas, suggest proposals and provide feedback to support your ambitions in this area.
Thank you for reading this newsletter. David Grant, Director of Propulsion Futures Beacon
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for the transformative miniaturization and functionalization of semiconductors, supporting a wide-ranging programme of fundamental science and application-driven research.
high angle of attack flight, such as take-off. The WINGPULSE project aims to mitigate the adverse effect of UHBR integration by incorporating novel active flow control (AFC) technology. AFC, in the form of pulsing air through a series of fine slots in the wing in the vicinity of the slat cutback, has the potential to reduce drag and recover maximum lift.
ctober 2021 - June 2022. 
supported by £4m of funding from the Propulsion Futures Beacon alongside additional investment.
etic, physical-organic and theoretical chemistry. The Woodward group plan to use these rings as precursors to a range of new light-weight organic (electronic) materials. The article will feature on one of the journal covers this month and the initial macrocycle is already commercially available.
collaboration and accelerate the development of battery materials at Nottingham, several OXLiD researchers now occupy laboratory and office space within the Carbon Neutral Laboratories on Jubilee Campus. 
